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If you don't return something at the end of a contract is that theft? or piracy? Its not like the UK had a choice. We're you expecting them to go all Hawaii on

If you don't return something at the end of a contract is that theft? or piracy? Its not like the UK had a choice. We're you expecting them to go all Hawaii on the situation and just annex it?

delecti 6y ago
The government they made the contract with didn't even exist anymore. The Qing Empire made that contract with the UK. Independence or just keeping HK in the UK both make at least as much sense as giving it to a country that didn't even exist when the contract was formed.
- throwaway1997 6y ago
  It may have made sense technically but China has a huge army and HK is dependent on water, electricity and food which comes from the mainland. The mainland government made very clear that if HK wasn't returned, they would cut off the water supply.
  - delecti 6y ago
    That's a separate issue though. That China had the military might to take HK doesn't mean they were the legitimate government to have HK returned to. It's not stealing from China to not give them something taken from someone else.
    - free_rms 6y ago
      The UK running HK in the first place was stealing from China. They originally got it as part of the peace settlement from the Opium Wars, then signed the 99-year lease later when the Qing empire was in terminal decline and unable to resist.
      - skissane 6y ago
        If UK had not switched recognition from ROC to PRC, they could have returned it to ROC instead. UK could have demanded a lease renewal from PRC as the price for switching recognition. Instead they just got some “alliance” against the Soviets and it is questionable what that actually delivered.
        free_rms 6y ago
        If you're gonna go pro-colonialist might makes right, that's your prerogative, but then you're just gonna have to eat it on the fact that the PRC had a lot more might nearby.
        skissane 6y ago
        I don’t see how handing HK over to ROC would have been “pro-colonialist”.
        free_rms 6y ago
        Presuming to control HKs fate after taking it in the freaking opium wars is. Giving HK back to China is an act of decolonization. Putting them under Taiwan and loading up the island with US weapons would not be.
        skissane 6y ago
        Is Taiwan’s democracy “pro-colonialism” too? PRC is itself a colonialist power. See all the Uighurs in concentration camps.
        throwaway1997 6y ago
        Do you think we are happier now that we have been "handed back to the motherland" or is China happy? Why does the opinion and desires of Hong Kong citizens not mater in your mind?
        free_rms 6y ago
- prewett 6y ago
  The government that ruled the territory of the Qing Empire was willing to roll tanks into HK--Deng Xiaoping said "I could take it in an afternoon". China made it clear that they were going to end up with HK one way or another. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handover_of_Hong_Kong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handover_of_Hong_Kong
- tasogare 6y ago
  Then Honk Hong should have been given back to the Republic of China (Taiwan) which is the direct successor of the Qing empire, not the PRC. RPC is not a successor of Qing nor ROC since ROC still exists.
  - delecti 6y ago
    Honestly I think so too, but I doubt the UK government wanted to start a war with China.
    - tasogare 6y ago
      Hum I was half trolling half serious, having skin in the game in favour of Taiwan. Interesting the game Wargame: Red Dragon has exactly a campaign about UK vs PRC over HK. And I spoke that after having of talk with a Japanese people today and they fear they are the next on the list. I told them Japan at like 6th or 5th powerful army despite Article 9, + US alliance (that we all understand as half trustable only), so quite able to defend themselves. A lot of people in East Asian (HK, Vietnam, Philipines, Japan) fear China. This is what I got from talking with friends from this country. Everyone think there will be war at some point, only the time and starting place is unknown.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    The UK already formally recognized the PRC as the sole government of China, and, as such the successor to ROC and Qing interests. Sure, this was in large part about who has the most guns, but it's not like the UK control of HK itself was a result of a free and uncoerced agreement of the parties, either.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > The Qing Empire made that contract with the UK. You really want to set the precedent that regime change voids all international agreements, rather than obligations and rights under them passing to successor regimes?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- hungryhobo 6y ago
  So if country A asks for a loan, then immediately dissolve its government and form a new one, should the loan be forgiven?
  - delecti 6y ago
    That's a wildly different situation for a couple reasons. The debt is in the opposite direction, and the UK had HK for 100 years, not "immediately". It's not really a relevant thought experiment.
woodpanel 6y ago
While the reasoning resonates with me, it does have undertones of whataboutism in it: Do I really expect CPC-historians to label colonial era contracts to be legitimate? Anyways, Singapore's independence wasn't a given either, they had to fight for theirs from "the mother land" as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_in_Malaysia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_in_Malaysia Edit: I stand corrected - Not "to fight". However, the point being (as with Belize, Israel, India or other colonies which became independent) by no means was it clear what entities were to became out of its former colonies.
- magicsmoke 6y ago
  Singapore was kicked out of Malaysia because they were majority Han Chinese and Malaysia wanted racial policies favoring Malays which would get outvoted in a democratic Malysia with Singapore in it. Singapore is one of those unusual countries where they didn't want independence but was forced into it.
ViViDboarder 6y ago
Apparently contracts between nations don’t mean much given this situation we’re in is because China is violating one.
ryan_j_naughton 6y ago
The British could have done what they did with Belize. Belize wanted independence but Guatemala claimed that it was actually a province/state of Guatemala. The British supported independence and left a battalion of troops in Belize, the British Forces Belize, in order to act as a deterrent to a Guatemalan invasion.[1][2] While China is obviously much more powerful than Guatemala, they still wouldn't have been able to invade given that it would have caused a nuclear war. Also, at that point China was much weaker economically so an economic war would have severely hurt their economic growth, undermining the key source of their power over the past 20 years. The real issue is that HK wasn't viable without support from the mainland -- support they would have lost had this tactic been tried. "Although not quite a piece of "barren rock" as derided by Lord Palmerston, Britain’s foreign secretary during the First Opium War, from 1839 to 1842, the fact remains that Hong Kong isn’t endowed with the necessary natural resources to support its population of 7 million. The Hong Kong special administrative region of China gets over 70 percent of its water from Dongjiang, a river in neighboring Guangdong province. Meanwhile, over 90 percent of fresh meat and vegetables consumed in Hong Kong is sourced from the mainland. And mainland energy sources generate more than half of the electricity consumed locally."[3] They would have had to bear a massive cost, investing in desalination plants, nuclear power plants, and imported their food from elsewhere. That cost -- while extreme -- might be looked at in hindsight as cheaper than the current outcome with the likely significant brain drain from HK. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belizean%E2%80%93Guatemalan_territorial_dispute#Post-independence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belizean%E2%80%93Guatemalan_te... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Army_Training_and_Support_Unit_Belize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Army_Training_and_Supp... [3] https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/08/21/hong-kongs-inconvenient-truth/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/08/21/hong-kongs-inconvenient...
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > While China is obviously much more powerful than Guatemala, China isn't just more powerful than Guatemala, it's more powerful than the UK. > they still wouldn't have been able to invade given that it would have caused a nuclear war. If Deng Xiaoping really thought the UK would accept nuclear ese as the cost of keeping China out of HK, sure, that might have kept China out. But literally no one would believe that.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> If you don't return something at the end of a contract is that theft? or piracy? I'll take, “A routine practice of European (including states that are former European colonies) colonialism in dealing with non-Europeans”. So, like, no one would have been surprised with Hong Kong. > We're you expecting them to go all Hawaii on the situation and just annex it? The UK was pulling that kind of thing before the US existed, so, sure, why not? I lean, ignoring the poder balance in the región, which is the real issue.

If you don't return something at the end of a contract is that theft? or piracy? Its not like the UK had a choice. We're you expecting them to go all Hawaii on the situation and just annex it?

delecti 6y ago

The government they made the contract with didn't even exist anymore. The Qing Empire made that contract with the UK. Independence or just keeping HK in the UK both make at least as much sense as giving it to a country that didn't even exist when the contract was formed.

throwaway1997 6y ago
It may have made sense technically but China has a huge army and HK is dependent on water, electricity and food which comes from the mainland. The mainland government made very clear that if HK wasn't returned, they would cut off the water supply.
- delecti 6y ago
  That's a separate issue though. That China had the military might to take HK doesn't mean they were the legitimate government to have HK returned to. It's not stealing from China to not give them something taken from someone else.
  - free_rms 6y ago
    The UK running HK in the first place was stealing from China. They originally got it as part of the peace settlement from the Opium Wars, then signed the 99-year lease later when the Qing empire was in terminal decline and unable to resist.
    - skissane 6y ago
      If UK had not switched recognition from ROC to PRC, they could have returned it to ROC instead. UK could have demanded a lease renewal from PRC as the price for switching recognition. Instead they just got some “alliance” against the Soviets and it is questionable what that actually delivered.
      - free_rms 6y ago
        If you're gonna go pro-colonialist might makes right, that's your prerogative, but then you're just gonna have to eat it on the fact that the PRC had a lot more might nearby.
        skissane 6y ago
        I don’t see how handing HK over to ROC would have been “pro-colonialist”.
        free_rms 6y ago
        Presuming to control HKs fate after taking it in the freaking opium wars is. Giving HK back to China is an act of decolonization. Putting them under Taiwan and loading up the island with US weapons would not be.
        skissane 6y ago
        Is Taiwan’s democracy “pro-colonialism” too? PRC is itself a colonialist power. See all the Uighurs in concentration camps.
        throwaway1997 6y ago
        Do you think we are happier now that we have been "handed back to the motherland" or is China happy? Why does the opinion and desires of Hong Kong citizens not mater in your mind?
        free_rms 6y ago
prewett 6y ago
The government that ruled the territory of the Qing Empire was willing to roll tanks into HK--Deng Xiaoping said "I could take it in an afternoon". China made it clear that they were going to end up with HK one way or another. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handover_of_Hong_Kong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handover_of_Hong_Kong
tasogare 6y ago
Then Honk Hong should have been given back to the Republic of China (Taiwan) which is the direct successor of the Qing empire, not the PRC. RPC is not a successor of Qing nor ROC since ROC still exists.
- delecti 6y ago
  Honestly I think so too, but I doubt the UK government wanted to start a war with China.
  - tasogare 6y ago
    Hum I was half trolling half serious, having skin in the game in favour of Taiwan. Interesting the game Wargame: Red Dragon has exactly a campaign about UK vs PRC over HK. And I spoke that after having of talk with a Japanese people today and they fear they are the next on the list. I told them Japan at like 6th or 5th powerful army despite Article 9, + US alliance (that we all understand as half trustable only), so quite able to defend themselves. A lot of people in East Asian (HK, Vietnam, Philipines, Japan) fear China. This is what I got from talking with friends from this country. Everyone think there will be war at some point, only the time and starting place is unknown.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  The UK already formally recognized the PRC as the sole government of China, and, as such the successor to ROC and Qing interests. Sure, this was in large part about who has the most guns, but it's not like the UK control of HK itself was a result of a free and uncoerced agreement of the parties, either.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> The Qing Empire made that contract with the UK. You really want to set the precedent that regime change voids all international agreements, rather than obligations and rights under them passing to successor regimes?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
hungryhobo 6y ago
So if country A asks for a loan, then immediately dissolve its government and form a new one, should the loan be forgiven?
- delecti 6y ago
  That's a wildly different situation for a couple reasons. The debt is in the opposite direction, and the UK had HK for 100 years, not "immediately". It's not really a relevant thought experiment.

woodpanel 6y ago

While the reasoning resonates with me, it does have undertones of whataboutism in it: Do I really expect CPC-historians to label colonial era contracts to be legitimate? Anyways, Singapore's independence wasn't a given either, they had to fight for theirs from "the mother land" as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_in_Malaysia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_in_Malaysia Edit: I stand corrected - Not "to fight". However, the point being (as with Belize, Israel, India or other colonies which became independent) by no means was it clear what entities were to became out of its former colonies.

magicsmoke 6y ago
Singapore was kicked out of Malaysia because they were majority Han Chinese and Malaysia wanted racial policies favoring Malays which would get outvoted in a democratic Malysia with Singapore in it. Singapore is one of those unusual countries where they didn't want independence but was forced into it.

ViViDboarder 6y ago

Apparently contracts between nations don’t mean much given this situation we’re in is because China is violating one.

ryan_j_naughton 6y ago

The British could have done what they did with Belize. Belize wanted independence but Guatemala claimed that it was actually a province/state of Guatemala. The British supported independence and left a battalion of troops in Belize, the British Forces Belize, in order to act as a deterrent to a Guatemalan invasion.[1][2] While China is obviously much more powerful than Guatemala, they still wouldn't have been able to invade given that it would have caused a nuclear war. Also, at that point China was much weaker economically so an economic war would have severely hurt their economic growth, undermining the key source of their power over the past 20 years. The real issue is that HK wasn't viable without support from the mainland -- support they would have lost had this tactic been tried. "Although not quite a piece of "barren rock" as derided by Lord Palmerston, Britain’s foreign secretary during the First Opium War, from 1839 to 1842, the fact remains that Hong Kong isn’t endowed with the necessary natural resources to support its population of 7 million. The Hong Kong special administrative region of China gets over 70 percent of its water from Dongjiang, a river in neighboring Guangdong province. Meanwhile, over 90 percent of fresh meat and vegetables consumed in Hong Kong is sourced from the mainland. And mainland energy sources generate more than half of the electricity consumed locally."[3] They would have had to bear a massive cost, investing in desalination plants, nuclear power plants, and imported their food from elsewhere. That cost -- while extreme -- might be looked at in hindsight as cheaper than the current outcome with the likely significant brain drain from HK. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belizean%E2%80%93Guatemalan_territorial_dispute#Post-independence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belizean%E2%80%93Guatemalan_te... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Army_Training_and_Support_Unit_Belize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Army_Training_and_Supp... [3] https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/08/21/hong-kongs-inconvenient-truth/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/08/21/hong-kongs-inconvenient...

dragonwriter 6y ago
> While China is obviously much more powerful than Guatemala, China isn't just more powerful than Guatemala, it's more powerful than the UK. > they still wouldn't have been able to invade given that it would have caused a nuclear war. If Deng Xiaoping really thought the UK would accept nuclear ese as the cost of keeping China out of HK, sure, that might have kept China out. But literally no one would believe that.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> If you don't return something at the end of a contract is that theft? or piracy? I'll take, “A routine practice of European (including states that are former European colonies) colonialism in dealing with non-Europeans”. So, like, no one would have been surprised with Hong Kong. > We're you expecting them to go all Hawaii on the situation and just annex it? The UK was pulling that kind of thing before the US existed, so, sure, why not? I lean, ignoring the poder balance in the región, which is the real issue.